The Second Pair
by My Dear Professor McGonagall
Summary: "For were there such friends anywhere as Slytherin and Gryffindor? Unless it was the second pair, of Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw?" A story of the lives and enduring, if strained, friendship between Helga Hufflepuff and Rowena Ravenclaw.
1. Chapter 1

**I**

"Helga Hufflepuff."

Helga turned—her childhood friend stood in the doorway of the Hufflepuffs' cottage. "Rowena!" she cried, hurrying to embrace her. "I thought you were abroad!"

"I am home again," said Rowena. "And—Helga, I have exciting news."

Helga blinked. "What is it?"

"Do you still dream of teaching magic, Helga?" Rowena asked.

"That would be a dream, indeed," Helga sighed, looking over her shoulder to her mother's work: the villagers' piles of unwashed laundry.

"I am trying to found a school," Rowena told her. "Along with two acquaintances, from my journeys."

Helga gasped. "Truly?" she whispered.

Rowena grinned.

**II**

"Come now, you are barely seventeen years old," scoffed Godric Gryffindor, and Helga flinched.

"Go home to your mother, little one. I do not know why Rowena brought you here," Salazar Slytherin said.

"She is intelligent," Rowena snapped, rooting Helga to the spot with an arm about her shoulders. "You will understand if you take the time to know her. She is the cohesive force we need to stop our endless arguing and really do what we say we shall. I feel it."

Godric lifted his eyebrows skeptically. "Do you speak, little Puff?" he asked.

"That's Hufflepuff," Helga said proudly.

**III**

Salazar, Godric, Helga, and Rowena stood in the newly-constructed Great Hall.

"Thank you," said Helga, beaming at them. "I never thought I would be able to share my love for magic with anyone but my future children, but you have all given me much more."

"You have given us a great deal, yourself, Helga," Rowena said, smiling and embracing her.

"I suppose it was not such an error to include you, little Puff," Godric teased.

"May I remind you all that we will have our first students here in a matter of hours?" Salazar asked, though even he was smiling.

**IV**

"You have the loveliest hair," Helga said gently, braiding Rowena's hair as they dressed for the Founding Day feast.

Rowena smiled at her in the looking glass. "You have the kindest heart," she said. She frowned slightly, polishing her diadem.

Helga looked down for a moment. "A kind heart will not always win out over true beauty," she said, tying off the braid.

Rowena shrugged, delicately setting the diadem on her dark curls. "Who's to say one must win over the other?" she asked, rising. She faced Helga and took her shoulders. "You have inner beauty. That is pure gold."

**V**

Helga Hufflepuff was never more grateful for anything in her life than her friends, especially Rowena. To Helga, nothing was more important than the bond shared by the best of friends.

In those early days at the castle, Helga and Rowena never exchanged a single cross word. As a matter of fact, Helga couldn't remember being angry until one afternoon, when she came upon Rowena sitting in an empty classroom, sobbing.

"Rowena, what can be the matter?" she asked earnestly. "Come, let me help you."

Rowena looked up, her face blotchy and red. "You are naïve, Helga Hufflepuff," she spat.

**VI**

"Rowena, you are my dearest friend," Helga told her desperately, clinging to Rowena's wrist as she tried to storm from the office. "I cannot stand to see you this way."

"Then leave me be, Helga!" Rowena snapped. "All our lives I have watched you try to involve yourself in matters that do not concern you. Now, I offer you this advice; give up. Stop behaving like such a fool."

Rowena's Stinging Hex burned her hand, and Helga released her as tears filled her eyes.

"You did not mean that," Helga whispered.

Rowena sighed in irritation. "I did not. I apologize."

* * *

><p>Fifty drabbles to tell the story of the founders' lives, specifically Hufflepuff's and Ravenclaw's! :) This was a really difficult project...I hope you like it! One chapter per day (ten days). This is for astronauts "50 Reasons, 50 Drabbles" Challenge. Thanks, everybody!<p>

Lucy


	2. Chapter 2

**VII**

"Helga, if there is one fault I must acknowledge in you, my dear friend, it is your ridiculous insistence that all students are possessed of evenly-matched qualities," Rowena said calmly.

"I think it unwise to divide them," Helga said firmly.

"What of those who like activity?" Godric asked. "Your pet students are not brave or wild, Helga."

"No, but—"

"Students of low blood should not mix with the pure," Salazar added.

"And the intelligent deserve recognition," Rowena said.

"And what of the students who do not fit those, whose only desire is to learn?" Helga demanded, slapping the tabletop.

**VIII**

The fifth year that Hogwarts opened its doors saw the first time that the Animatus Charm on Godric's old hat was successfully implemented, and all of the students were divided into one of four Houses—each named for one of the founders.

That night, Helga sat in her private rooms, crying. There came a knock at the door. "Come in," she called, quickly wiping her face. Rowena opened the door.

"Are you all right, Helga?" she asked, frowning.

Helga's chin trembled. "Have we destroyed our school?" she whispered.

Rowena sighed and sat down beside her. "Of course not," she promised.

**IX**

"Rowena?"

"Not now, please, Helga, I am very busy," Rowena said, sounding exhausted as she scribbled notes.

"You are not wearing the diadem," Helga pointed out. Rowena sighed. "I only wanted to know if you were all right, after this morning…Godric and Salazar…"

"Are fully-grown men who do not require our attention or unnecessary hovering," Rowena huffed, looking away.

"I did not mean them," Helga said, coming closer, and Rowena's eyes filled with tears.

"What if he chooses to leave?" she asked hoarsely.

"What if he does?" Helga asked.

Rowena said nothing for a moment. Then—

"I love him, Helga."

**X**

"Rowena, if it upsets you—"

"I am not upset, Helga," Rowena insisted.

"It was not an intentional—"

"Love is hardly ever intentional," Rowena said bitterly. "I of all people can understand that."

Helga sighed. "I do not know how to answer him," she said at last.

Rowena fixed her with a sharp glare. "Do you love him?"

Silence.

"Yes," Helga admitted at last.

"Then say yes," Rowena insisted. "Do not let my bad luck with Salazar tamper with your feelings for Godric. Go to him. Tell him you will marry him. You want to, I know."

Helga smiled.

**XI**

"I know you are angry, Rowena," Helga said. "But please, calm down, Godric is bad enough without—"

"I am beyond angry, Helga," Rowena snarled. "I am livid. I am hurt, I am enraged—I am furious. Salazar is a coward, a coward and a turncoat and everything that—that's foul—and—" she groaned and collapsed onto the sofa beside Helga, burying her face in her hands. "And this is no use to anybody."

Helga patted her arm. "I understand," she said, drawing her wand and summoning the crystal bottle of elf-made wine from Rowena's bureau. "It's all right…"


	3. Chapter 3

**XII**

"We are losing our female enrollment, Rowena," Helga said, shaking her head as she reviewed the latest figures. "More than half of them do not finish seventh year for the simple reason of pregnancy."

Rowena frowned. She had been easily nauseated by the sweltering summer heat, lately, and was distinctly out of sorts. "Perhaps our ladies would benefit from learning the Smoothing Charm I put on the staircase when Salazar and I argued in the entrance hall," she grouched, scribbling something out with her quill.

The idea struck both Helga and Rowena at the same time, and their eyes met.

**XIII**

"I do not understand how this can be, Rowena," Helga said quietly.

"It really is simple, you and Godric ought to try it," Rowena snapped.

Helga ignored this, though it hurt. She understood why Rowena felt defensive. As the only female professors, it was beyond humiliating for either of them to faint in front of the students.

"It must be Salazar's child," Rowena murmured.

A wave of understanding crashed over Helga. "How will we reach him?" she asked quietly.

"I cannot say."

"Would you like me to—?"

"Helga, may I have a few moments to myself, please?"

"Of course."

**XIV**

"And what of the students?" Godric thundered. "She cannot—"

"Godric, Hogwarts is a safe haven," Helga reminded him. "Surely you can appreciate the fact that without Salazar, Rowena needs us?"

"We are entrusted with the education—"

"And what you propose now is the banishment of our finest educator," Helga told him. "Finer than you or I could hope to be, Godric."

Godric glared.

When Helga returned to Rowena's rooms that evening, she was smiling. "You are not leaving," she said happily. "I have convinced him."

Rowena simply nodded, combing her hair as she gazed absently out the window.

**XV**

"Are you well, Rowena?" Helga asked, as Rowena sat down beside her at the head table.

"Perfectly," Rowena said with a wry smile.

"If you require me to substitute…?"

"I appreciate that, Helga, but there is no need," Rowena assured her, patting her hand and smiling. "Unless you know of a way to stop my condition from being so difficult, of course," she said.

Helga smiled, but felt a small stab of pain and envy in her heart. She watched Rowena rest a hand on her swollen middle, which was skillfully hidden by Helga's charmwork on her gown, and sighed.

**XVI**

"And _why_ may I not continue to teach my students?" Rowena asked tartly, holding her seven-month belly. She sat on the sofa in her private room. "I am with child, that is all."

"Rowena, please," Helga said calmingly.

"Madam Ravenclaw, you lead a strenuous life," the Healer said. "It is not healthy—"

"It seems utterly foolish," Rowena snapped, looking away. Helga thanked the Healer and showed her out before turning back to Rowena. Now stretched out on the sofa, resting, Rowena still looked angry—and very, very tired.

"You ought to appreciate this gift, my friend," Helga said delicately.

**XVII**

"Nearly there, Rowena," Helga said soothingly, smoothing Rowena's sweaty hair.

"I shall curse you if you say those words again, I swear it," Rowena snarled, pressing hard on her enormous belly.

"Come now," said the midwife. "Once again—"

Rowena screamed, crushing Helga's hand in her own—Helga felt her bones break as, moments later, the newborn's cries sounded in Rowena's small stone bedchamber.

Rowena collapsed backwards, releasing Helga, who pressed her lips together, clutching her broken hand as she turned away.

Rowena groaned faintly, feverish and in terrible pain, and Helga recovered herself, soothing her through her own tears.

**XVIII**

Helga—her broken hand still heavily bandaged—sat with Rowena outside Helga and Godric's cottage in the highlands. Rowena was wrapped in blankets on a sofa Helga had conjured, cradling two-month-old Helena.

Helga smiled as Rowena held the infant. Being away from the castle, even for these few weeks of early summer, had done wonders for Rowena's health; she was stronger, with more color in her cheeks and a kinder demeanor than she'd had for nearly a year.

Rowena lifted herself to look over at Helga and smiled. "Thank you for taking care of us," she said.

Helga's heart warmed.

* * *

><p>Hope you guys are liking! Please review if you decide to favorite or story alert! I'd love to hear what you have to say. I know Founders pieces tend to be less popular... :)<p>

Lucy


	4. Chapter 4

**XIX**

"I envy you Helena," Helga sighed, smiling sadly as she and Rowena sat on the sprawling Hogwarts lawn. Little Helena giggled in Rowena's lap, snatching at a passing butterfly and giggling as her beautiful brown hair caught the sunlight.

"There is no reason that you and Godric cannot have a very healthy child," Rowena assured her briskly. "Perhaps there is something we can brew to help you? Let me think on it."

Helga smiled, but inside her heart was aching. Rowena was brilliant, but she did not understand that for Helga, false hope was worse than no hope at all.

**XX**

"Rowena," Helga said excitedly, kneeling at Rowena's bedside. She glanced over to the cot where Helena slept. "Rowena, wake, please!" she whispered.

Slowly, Rowena opened her eyes, frowning. "Helga? What is it? Is there trouble?"

Helga shook her head. "No, no," she said, barely able to keep the excitement from her voice. "It worked. Your brew worked. Godric and I—" Her eyes full of tears, she touched a hand to her middle, and Rowena sat up, her expression amazed.

"It worked," she repeated, and Helga nodded happily.

"Rowena, thank you," she said.

"I did it," Rowena said, sounding amazed.

**XXI**

"How will I tell Godric?" Helga wondered aloud.

"Simply tell him," Rowena said coolly, closing her potion kit.

"But this is—_oh_—ow—tremendous news," Helga insisted, sitting up and clutching her belly. Though she was not far along, she was already quite large. "Surely there is some way to thrill him with it?"

"I never had the opportunity to share my news with Salazar, if you remember," Rowena said, starting for the door. "Perhaps I am not the person to ask for advice, my friend." She left the bedchamber.

Helga looked down, ashamed, as both babies began to kick.

**XXII**

"Perhaps you did your work too well," Helga joked, holding her sore back as she lowered herself awkwardly onto Rowena's sofa. "I am not sure that carrying two children agrees with me at all."

"You will survive," Rowena said brusquely, levitating a tray to sit on the table and buttering a slice of bread, which she offered to two-year-old Helena, who played on the floor.

Helga frowned, one hand on her belly. "Of course," she said, touching Rowena's arm. "There is no need to worry about that. Between you and Godric, I am well cared for."

Rowena nodded, looking away.

**XXIII**

"Helga, I am sorry," Godric said, taking Helga's hand. "I've not heard from her."

"She is busy," Helga said faintly, rubbing her very large belly as she lay in bed. "She will be here when she receives my message."

"Are you sure of that?" Godric growled. "She has been rather distant from you these last months."

"She teaches more students now to make up for my condition," sighed Helga, her eyes closed. "She will be here."

Godric fell silent. Helga winced painfully, and he stroked her hair. "The midwife will be here soon," he promised soothingly.

Helga nodded. "And Rowena…"

**XXIV**

"I must apologize to you, Helga," Rowena said, looking uncomfortable. "I—I have not been the friend you have needed." She sat with Helga in hers and Godric's private rooms, holding Morgana, one of the month-old twins.

Helga nodded, cradling Godric, named for his father. "I accept your apology, Rowena," she said at last.

"You forgive so readily, I do not have the chance to alleviate my feelings," Rowena said rather ruefully. "You once said you envied me Helena." Her lip quivered, and she looked down at sleeping Morgana. "I envy you a husband."

Helga closed her eyes, finally understanding.

* * *

><p>The founders seem to be really unpopular with you guys (or maybe you're just tired of me)! hahaha<p>

I hate to beg for reviews, but...*BEG*

Tell me what I'm doing right or wrong! :) Thank you!

Tons of love, Lucy


	5. Chapter 5

**XXV**

Helga and Rowena sat in the office as three young children came running in from the summer heat.

"Mother, there is a man!" said nine-year-old Godric.

"At the gate," Morgana added.

"He knows you both, but refused me his name," Helena explained to Rowena. "He is dressed all in—"

"Green," Rowena said, paling. "To the tower, now, all of you, and do not come down until we send for you."

"Go, children," Helga said, and they obeyed. She faced Rowena, who looked faint.

"I will get Godric—"

"No. I will see him."

"Rowena, no—"

"I will, Helga."

**XXVI**

"She hates me," Rowena said hollowly. "She hates me, and I cannot blame her."

"Rowena, you must eat something, you—"

"He has a new life. He has a wife…children…"

"Rowena, please, at least lie down," Helga implored, and at last, Rowena seemed to hear her. Helga adjusted the pillows on the bed so that Rowena could lie comfortably. She was white as chalk.

"Helena will forgive you," Helga said. "She has had a terrible shock, as have you."

"No," Rowena said suddenly, sitting up. "I am well. It is Salazar who should be weak at the knees, not I."

**XXVII**

"You said nothing," Rowena accused. "You did not advise me otherwise."

Helga took a deep breath, folding her hands atop her desk. "I cannot pretend I thought it wise to avoid seeking out Salazar," she said. "But it was not my choice. You are Helena's mother, not I. I trust you to know what is best for her. And you forget, Rowena; if Salazar had not appeared from thin air, your decision would still be sound."

Rowena sat down, looking exhausted, and pulled off her diadem, dropping it to the desktop. "Even the wisest are blinded by emotion," she murmured.


	6. Chapter 6

**XXVIII**

"How is it that no matter what I do, I cannot do right by my own daughter?" Rowena groaned, dropping onto the sofa beside Helga. Helena had just stormed from the room to her dormitory, two floors below.

"First, she is angry that I did not find Salazar for her; then she is furious that he wishes to write to her!" Rowena said, rather hysterically. "Now, she is upset that I—_I_, Helga!—do not wish to see him again."

Helga rubbed Rowena's back soothingly. "This will pass, I promise."

"How?" Rowena asked desperately, her dark eyes full of tears.

**XXIX**

"Rowena…"

"Yes, Helga?"

"You do not look very well."

"I am quite well."

Silence.

"Are you certain?"

"Absolutely."

A longer silence.

"Do you know, I can remember a time when my own mother and I quarreled relentlessly, for nearly a month? I was around Helena's age—"

"Helga, I am trying to work through these essays."

"Oh—oh, yes, of course. I apologize, Rowena."

Silence.

"Helga?"

"Yes?"

"Your mother…did you get along with her, afterwards?"

A pause.

"I cannot say I have ever known a teenaged girl to sacrifice all love for her mother for an argument."

"Thank you, Helga."

**XXX**

"Helga!"

Helga started and nearly upset her inkwell over the copious notes she'd been taking for a new charm to teach the eldest students. She hurried to the door and opened it to reveal Rowena, looking utterly beside herself with joy.

"He has asked," Rowena said, hurrying inside and taking Helga's shoulders. "He has asked for Helena's hand."

"The baron's son?" Helga asked, clapping a hand over her mouth, and Rowena nodded.

"She will have status, and money, and everything she deserves," Rowena gushed.

"If she says yes," Helga teased.

"Oh, bite your tongue," Rowena said, swatting her, but laughing.

**XXXI**

"Do not despair, Rowena, keep hope," Helga said. "Seventeen is young…Helena is wild. She needs this time for herself. Perhaps, in another year she will be ready to marry the boy."

"She has done this to spite me," Rowena snapped. "She has not forgiven me for Salazar."

"Rowena, Helena is not that cruel," Helga said. "She is as kind as can be, you know this."

Rowena stopped her frantic pacing at last, and sank down into the chair behind her desk. "I have only ever wanted the best for her," she whispered.

Helga nodded. "She will understand that, one day."


	7. Chapter 7

**XXXII**

"Rowena? It is well past noon," Helga called through the door. "Are you well? The students have left…"

There was no response. Helga drew her wand and looked at Godric, who nodded worriedly.

"_Alohomora_." The lock clicked, and Helga, holding Godric's hand, entered the pitch-dark bedchamber. "Rowena," Helga called. "Where are you?"

"She is gone."

Helga nearly jumped out of her skin. Then, Godric pointed—Rowena sat by the window, still in her nightclothes. Helga hurried over to her.

"What are you talking about?" Helga asked, kneeling before her and taking her ice-cold hands.

"Helena," Rowena whispered. "Helena is gone."

**XXXIII**

Helga walked into the office, removing her cloak.

"Germany," Rowena said, lunging forward and seizing her shoulders. "She is in Germany."

It took Helga a moment to understand what she said, prizing Rowena's much-too-thin fingers from her arms and guiding her into a chair. "Are you certain?" she asked calmly.

Rowena's eyes were wide, too large for her lined, tired face. "I—I believe—" and suddenly, she wilted. "No," she admitted faintly, holding a shaking hand over her eyes.

Helga's heart broke. She smoothed Rowena's graying hair. "We will find her," she promised. "Unless she returns to us first."

**XXXIV**

"Ah, Rowena, you look lovely," Helga said, beaming as Rowena came from her bedroom, smoothing the blue brocade gown that hung on her frame.

Rowena faced the mirror. "I look so old." She touched the deepening creases on her brow.

Helga took hold of her narrow shoulders. "Twenty-five years have aged _all of us_," she said bracingly. "Look at Godric," she added, nodding to her husband, who was lounged on the sofa. "More white than red to his beard, nowadays."

"Oho, very funny," Godric groaned, rising. "Come, ladies, we have a Yule Ball to attend."

Rowena smiled emptily, and followed.

**XXXV**

"I know that you and Godric talk about me," Rowena said dully, as Helga draped a blanket over her. It was midwinter, six months after Helena's departure; a precarious time for illness. Rowena's perpetually frail health was a constant source of worry for Helga.

"We talk because we worry about you," Helga said, gently kissing Rowena's hair.

"You do not even deny it," Rowena muttered, and Helga paused.

"Pardon me?" she asked, confused.

"Can't you leave me be, Helga? I wish to be alone," Rowena snapped.

Before she closed the door, Helga saw Rowena shove her blanket to the floor.

**XXXVI**

"Rowena, where is the diadem?" Helga asked, frowning as she straightened Rowena's vanity. "It is not in its box."

"I must have left it in my study," Rowena said from the bed, grading papers; she had had a dreadful cough, but was getting better. She would return to her classroom tomorrow. "Leave it be, Helga, I will collect it later."

Helga closed the box, but faced Rowena. "Rowena—I have not seen you wear the diadem in a very long time," she said slowly.

Rowena shrugged, absorbed in her work. "I do not always require it."

Helga frowned.

"Goodnight, Helga."

**XXXVII**

"Rowena, please," Helga whispered, holding a hand to her breast and trying to hold back her tears. "Not—not here, please, let us go back to the tower—you are not thinking clearly—" She looked desperately around at the students, who were gathered in the entrance hall, watching the unfolding drama between their three headmasters.

"I have not thought clearly for far too long, Helga," Rowena laughed rather desperately. "I must leave Hogwarts. I do not wish to, but I must. I apologize."

"Rowena," Godric began.

"Goodbye," Rowena said loudly—then she paused. "I will return, I promise you."


	8. Chapter 8

**XXXVIII**

_Dearest Rowena,_

_I hope that this letter finds you speedily, wherever you are. Godric and the twins and I miss you terribly, as do your students. Hogwarts is not the same without you. Please, my dear friend; be careful. Helena is young; you are not, and I mean that with all the love I have in my heart._

_I hope you are keeping well. Remember, you may have the answers to the universe, but I have the warm blanket to protect you from the thunderstorm pouring down on you as you think of them._

_Write soon._

_All my love,_

_Helga_

**XXXIX**

_Darling Helga,_

_I am safe. I am getting closer to Helena by the day, I can tell. I keep well enough; I sleep and eat._

_I must confess, these journeys have given me no answers to the universe, though I would like a warm blanket or two now and again. I cannot tell you where I am; just know that as soon as Helena and I are reunited, we will be home. Give Godric my love, and hug your darling twins. Tell them that I promise I will see them very soon, in time for their sixteenth birthday._

_Love,_

_Rowena_

**XL**

_Rowena,_

_This is my third message to you in as many months, with no reply. Rowena, I beg you to answer. Godric is beside himself, and he is threatening a journey of his own to find you unless we hear from you. Please, Rowena, please answer me. Have you yet found Helena? Is she alive? Someone must be receiving my letters, for the owls have all come back without them._

_If we do not hear from you within a week, Godric is coming to find you. I am sorry, but we must know if you are unharmed._

_Worrying endlessly,_

_Helga_

**XLI**

_My Helga,_

_I did not have to go far from the Germanic capital to find her. She lies now in a Muggle hospital, though it can hardly be called such; She is very ill, though she recognizes me, and remembers you. I must wait until the middle of the night to transport her home. We arrive at midnight on Friday; please be ready for us. She wishes to write something here, and claims that it is meant for your eyes alone. I swear I will not read it._

_Godric_

_The region is called Albania. This is where she hides. – R._


	9. Chapter 9

**XLII**

"Godric," Helga gasped, lifting her lamp higher as Godric, carrying Rowena, ascended the front steps. Rowena was bound in blankets, far too thin, and breathing shallowly.

"Quiet, Helga, the students will hear," Godric warned, glancing over her shoulder to the entrance hall, where the hidden door to Helga's dormitories stood. "She does not look it, but she is alive."

"Oh, my darling," Helga said, kissing Rowena's pale, fevered forehead. Then she hurried them inside, for Godric looked on the verge of collapse.

When they had put Rowena in her bed in the tower, Helga kissed Godric. "Thank you, my husband."

**XLIII**

"Rowena," Helga said softly, smiling as her dear friend's eyes opened at last.

"How did I come here?" Rowena asked weakly.

"Godric found you," Helga answered. "He brought you back to us. Do you remember?"

Slowly, shakily, Rowena nodded. Then her eyes widened. "Albania," she said desperately, seizing Helga's arm. "The baron's son, I need him, he must go to Albania—try to win Helena's heart—"

"Rowena, please, calm yourself," Helga pleaded. "I will send for him, but only when you are stronger."

"It must be now," Rowena wailed, though she seemed to be losing consciousness again. "Now, Helga…"

**XLIV**

"I must go to your students for their Charms lesson, Helga," Godric said, rising and embracing her.

"Thank you," Helga said. She placed a cool cloth on Rowena's forehead.

"She looks better," Godric promised. Helga nodded silently. "Helga…you were never one to despair."

She smiled sadly. "I have hope yet." Godric nodded, and left her.

Before long, Rowena stirred. "Has Helena returned yet?" she asked, her eyes closed. Helga frowned, touching a hand to Rowena's burning cheek.

"Rowena, where has Helena gone?" she asked warily.

"She is off with the twins," Rowena murmured.

Closing her eyes, Helga began to weep.


	10. Chapter 10

**XLV**

Rowena stirred stiffly, and her lovely dark eyes found Helga's face. "Where…is…Helena?" she asked. She had taken to fazing in and out of lucidity; this was a clear moment.

"She is on her way," Helga said, flicking her wand to cool the cloth on Rowena's forehead.

Rowena sighed painfully. "Do you…know…why…I called her…Helena?" she asked, struggling for breath.

"No," Helga whispered.

"Because…of you," Rowena rasped. "She has…part of…my name—the end…so that she might…be wise…but the first…part is…yours…so that she might…first…be good."

Helga burst into tears. Rowena reached up weakly to touch Helga's face, and smiled.

"Wake…me…when…when Helena…arrives…" she whispered.

**XLVI**

Her neck and back aching badly, Helga raised her head from where she had fallen asleep on Rowena's mattress. She drew her wand and flicked it, lighting the candles in the chamber. She leaned over Rowena.

"Rowena," she said softly. Rowena did not answer. "Oh, no, _no_," Helga said, feeling tears rise.

One might have thought Rowena simply slept. Her long, gray hair fell over her shoulder in a thick braid, and she wore her favorite, oldest dressing gown. But, even Helga's infinitely hopeful heart could not deny the cool pallor of the thin, lined face.

Rowena Ravenclaw was dead.

**XLVII**

Helga folded Rowena's hands across her chest, tucking her wand securely beneath them. Her lip quivered. For lying in state, she had dressed Rowena in her favorite blue gown, decorated with gold stars.

"Helga," said Godric urgently, from behind her. "Helga, look."

She turned. "What—?" Then she gasped, clasping a hand to her heart. "_Helena_."

"Where is my mother?" asked the tall, beautiful ghost, her eyes full of tears.

"She h-has already p-passed," Helga stammered, stepping aside.

With an anguished, terrible scream, Helena's ghost threw herself against the body, sobbing madly as she tried vainly to embrace her mother.


	11. Chapter 11

**XLVIII**

"Leave this office," Godric growled. Helga squeezed his shoulders, preventing him from rising.

"I have no desire to linger, Godric, calm yourself," Salazar said loudly, removing his cloak and draping it across Helga's desk. "I wish to see Helena. I am not devoid of feeling; I _am_ her father. She must be grieving."

"You do not know?" Helga gasped, amazed, as Godric made a noise of disgust.

"Know?" Salazar asked.

"Salazar, Helena is—"

"Here."

Salazar spun.

Helena had floated through the door, her dark eyes narrowed in her mother's glare. "Let my _father_ see what has become of me."

**XLIX**

"Helena, that was…astounding," Helga said, sinking into her desk chair.

"I should have cursed him," Godric grumbled.

Helena stared at the door through which Salazar had just stormed. "He ruined my mother; I cannot forgive that. Even after all I did to her…he is equally responsible. If it were not for him…she would never have been burdened with me. She would be alive."

"Helena," Helga said, aghast. "Your mother loved you—"

"Yes," Helena agreed, smiling sadly. "And I her…but I should never have been born. My one comfort is that I have given her peace; he will never return."

* * *

><p>These next two chapters are the finale...:(<p>

So much sad. My next project is the next twelve months of Hearts of Ten, so hopefully that'll be happier...and then I've got something else for Helena coming down the pike.

The timing might be a little weird here, but these two take place within an hour of each other. Just so's ya know. And yeah, Helena pretty much gave Slytherin the bird. I need to write her more, she has a LOT of self-hatred...she and Snape should hang out some time.

Okay, now wait, that's a thought...


	12. Chapter 12

**L**

After Godric's death, Helga moved to Rowena's tower. She eventually grew very old and much, much too frail to teach anymore, but adored spending her retirement with her children and grandchildren. Helena was her constant companion.

On a beautiful summer night, the anniversary of Rowena's death, Helga lay atop her cushions on the worn sofa, wrapped in blankets and feeling completely exhausted. Although she had repeatedly assured Morgana and Godric (who now taught at Hogwarts themselves) that she was well, and merely tired easily in her old age, something was different tonight. Helga could feel it. She watched Helena, who floated near the tower window, reflecting starlight from the skies outside.

"You will stay, when I cannot?" Helga asked softly, unable to even move; she felt drained of all her strength.

"For all of eternity." Helena's smile was bitter. She turned, and saw immediately the change in Helga's demeanor. "I will fetch them," she said quietly.

"Thank you, my dear," Helga sighed.

Helena paused before the wall, looking back. "I love you, Aunt."

Helga smiled. "I love you, Helena. May you find peace here."

"Tell Mother…" Helena trailed off.

Helga nodded slowly, her eyes sliding shut. "Very soon, I think."


End file.
